A high-end hybrid Oriental restaurant combining Chinese and Japanese cuisines will open next month in the new Four Seasons hotel at Ten Trinity Square in the City of London. Mei Ume, a name bringing together the Chinese and Japanese words for “plum”, launches on June 9, joining star French chef Anne-Sophie Pic’s La Dame de Pic […]

Continue reading


Three-year-old pop-up The Oystermen is to open its first permanent venue in Covent Garden this summer. The Oystermen seafood bar and kitchen will be in foodie hot-spot Henrietta Street, where Ollie Dabbous has just opened his new restaurant in The Henrietta hotel and Gregory Marchand opened Frenchie last year. Unusually, The Oystermen is a business that […]

Continue reading


Ikoyi, an upmarket new restaurant showcasing the cuisine of West Africa, is to open in July in the new St James’s Market just south of Piccadilly Circus. It is a joint venture from school friends Iré Hassan-Odukale (pictured left), who was born in Ikoye, a cosmopolitan area of Lagos in Nigeria, and chef Jeremy Chan (right), whose […]

Continue reading


A pair of chefs with impressive kitchen credentials have teamed up to open a tiny venture in Mayfair inspired by the new wave of bistros in Paris. Launching in May, Neo Bistro will accommodate just 25 diners, with banquette tables that can be reserved and counter seats for walk-ins. Following the Parisian lead, it will offer a daily changing […]

Continue reading


One of London’s leading Japanese restaurants since it opened in Marylebone in 2006, Dinings is to launch a sister venue in Knightsbridge next month. Dinings SW3 aims to fuse Japanese tradition with European seafood bar culture, offering plateaux de fruits de mer fresh from Cornish dayboats, plus robata-style cuisine using a Josper grill, with a seasonal sake list […]

Continue reading


GBR – for Great British Restaurant – is the straight-to-the-point name of a new all-day dining venue opening in Dukes, the St James’s hotel, in May. Chef Nigel Mendham, who has worked in country house hotels including the Samling in the Lake District, South Lodge in Sussex and the Lygon Arms in the Cotswolds, has […]

Continue reading


Bang Bang Oriental, an eco-friendly food hall and restaurant complex seating up to 750 diners, is to open on the Edgware Road in Colindale, north London, this summer. Billed as the capital’s biggest Asian food hall, it will incorporate 33 individual kiosks offering street food from China, Korea, Japan, India, Vietnam, Singapore, Taiwan and Malaysia. […]

Continue reading